In the News

December 3, 2014 | This article was cross-posted at TIME.com. The defeat of the Keystone XL pipeline bill in the Senate last month may have been viewed as a blow to Sen. Mary Landrieu‘s re-election bid, but her battle to get the bill passed was warmly received by members of the oil and gas industry, including Keystone’s parent company.…

September 9, 2013 | NASA's rocket launch Friday from the outskirts of Washington made for great photo ops, but was also a reminder of the relationships the company has built on Capitol Hill with key lawmakers.

December 9, 2010 | While headlines touted Space Exploration Technologies' unmanned space journey as a giant leap away from large governments dominating the heavens -- only the governments of the United States, China, Russia, Japan, India and the European Union previously accomplished such a feat -- the company is hardly shielding itself from politics.

June 23, 2010 | Hearings to set to begin Thursday in the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, led by Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), will shine more light on the ongoing squabble with the Department of Education over issues like incentive pay to recruiters and gainful employment measures. But Congress is just catching up to industry lobbyists on many of the issues.

May 19, 2010 | Massive campaign war chests and establishment endorsements were not enough to be victorious in some of the country's most contested Senate primaries Tuesday night. One sitting Senator was defeated and another is heading to a run-off in three weeks, as candidates worked to distance themselves from Washington and position themselves as crusaders against special interests in charged anti-incumbent environments.

December 24, 2009 | Senators who opposed the health insurance reform bill passed on Christmas Eve received an average of nearly 30 percent more political donations from political action committees and individual employees of health and health insurance-related groups and companies since 1989, a Center for Responsive Politics analysis has found.

October 7, 2009 | CASTLE ON A (SENATE) CLOUD: Rep. Mike Castle (R-Del.) announced yesterday that he intends to run for the Senate seat left vacant by Vice President Joe Biden, turning the race into "one of the top races in the country," said National Republican Senatorial Committee chairman John Cornyn (R-Texas), according to The Hill. Cornyn also hinted that the race would be expensive.

July 9, 2009 | Over the past three weeks, Capital Eye has contacted members of five Capitol Hill committees responsible for drafting health care reform legislation this summer. Here are their responses (and non-responses) and the money they're collecting from various industries.

February 12, 2009 | The close ties between Rep. John Murtha and a Washington lobbying firm raided by the FBI have put the powerful Pennsylvania Democrat under greater scrutiny. The lobbyists at PMA Group have been Murtha's fifth most generous campaign donor over time, but he is just one of 284 members of the 111th Congress who have collected money from the firm, which specializes in securing federal earmarks for its clients. In total, PMA Group's employees and its political action committee have given current members of Congress $3.4 million since 1989.

September 23, 2008 | The last time Congress seriously debated how to regulate the financial industry, the result was legislation that allowed the nation's largest banks to get even larger and take risks that had been prohibited since the Great Depression. A look back at that debate, which was over the 1999 Financial Services Modernization Act, reveals that campaign contributions may have influenced the votes of politicians who, a decade later, are now grappling with the implosion of the giant banks they helped to foster.

September 16, 2008 | While other members of Congress rush to dump contributions from a California billionaire who has pleaded guilty in a massive stock fraud case, Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.) and Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) say they plan to keep thousands of dollars they received from the man, Henry Samueli, according to Politico. The nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics has found that Samueli and his wife, Susan, have given more than $250,000 to federal candidates and committees since the 2000 election cycle.

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